Wireless communication networks are widely deployed to provide various communication services such as telephony, video, data, messaging, broadcasts, and so on. Such networks, which are usually multiple access networks, support communications for multiple users by sharing the available network resources. One example of such a network is the UMTS Terrestrial Radio Access Network (UTRAN). The UTRAN is the radio access network (RAN) defined as a part of the Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS), a third generation (3G) mobile phone technology supported by the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP). The UMTS, which is the successor to Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) technologies, currently supports various air interface standards, such as Wideband-Code Division Multiple Access (WCDMA), Time Division-Code Division Multiple Access (TD-CDMA), and Time Division-Synchronous Code Division Multiple Access (TDSCDMA). The UMTS also supports enhanced 3G data communications protocols, such as High Speed Packet Access (HSPA), which provides higher data transfer speeds and capacity to associated UMTS networks. High Speed Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA) is a data service offered on the downlink of WCDMA networks.
In the older generation of W-CDMA networks, such as those described in the 3GPP technical specification 25.221 R99, which was released in 1999 and commonly known as R99, each user has a separate and independent communication path to the network base station (known as Node B) via a Dedicated Physical Channel (DPCH). As W-CDMA technology evolved, new physical channels were added to improve system operation and to accommodate ever increasing number of users. For example, in HSPA networks, a Fractional-DPCH (F-DPCH) was added to optimize the consumption of downlink channelization codes among multiples users. Current generation UEs (User Equipment) must support communications on both R99 DPCH and F-DPCH. However, due to many differences between communication protocols on these channels, certain optimizations of various channel parameters at the UE are desirable. Thus, as the demand for mobile broadband access continues to increase, research and development continue to advance the UMTS technologies not only to meet the growing demand for mobile broadband access, but to advance and enhance the user experience with mobile communications.